24/7 holiday shopping can happen on any device.
The feeding frenzy that marks the annual holiday shopping season is entering its final stages. With less than two weeks until Christmas, shoppers are steeling themselves for either one last visit to the mall or hoping that Amazon delivers all the gifts in time.
For retailers, it is a magical time of the year … and they don’t care how you shop or what you buy on as long as the cash is flowing and the shelves are emptying.
A recent survey of over 3,000 online retailers by performance marketing firm Criteo said that 40% of all transactions now take place on multiple devices, with smartphones and tablets leading the way. Cross-device shopping is increasingly popular among American consumers who might find an item on one device, research it on another and then buy it on a third, Criteo said.
Browse, Consider And Buy
According to Criteo’s State of Mobile Commerce Q3 2015 report, people who shop on multiple devices are 20% more likely to complete a purchase on a mobile device than the average shopper. The report said that 47% of consumers completed on a tablet while 43% paid with their smartphone. Desktop purchases accounted for 39% of final transactions in the multi-device model.
Mobile was the preferred option in 31% of all transactions in Q3, while 35% of purchases were cross-device based. Criteo said that shoppers were browsing on one device—a laptop or work PC, for example—and then buying the item on a mobile device later in the day.
“The idea that the mobile is just a research device is simply wrong,” said Criteo. “We expect the fraction of cross-device transactions completed on mobile to grow fast as shoppers get more and more comfortable with completing purchases while on the go.”
Data collected by eCommerce marketing company myThings on Black Friday and Cyber Monday in the U.S. and presented to ARC via email supports this prediction.
Smartphones and tablets were used in over 33% of all post-Thanksgiving sales, with tablets coming on strong in the early evening on both days. Desktop shopping was still the preferred option for a majority of bargain hunters, accounting for 64% of final purchases on Black Friday and 72% on Cyber Monday. Much like any app-based marketing company, myThings has its own agenda when it comes to pushing cross-device promotion, but the data does point to a shift in how we buy.
Multi-Device Transactions Are Not Just For Christmas
Being able to shop wherever and whenever you want is not limited to the holiday season. Far from it.
In fact, shopping is a 24/7 hobby for those that are happy to buy anything at any time. Impulse buying—while not normally a factor in choosing the perfect gift for a loved one—is ideally suited to mobile, especially if that transaction is being completed after a night out. It should be noted that there is no way to collate data on the number of people who may have bought stuff after a few beers, but the existence of online shopping experience drunkmall tells its own story.
Irrespective of when you choose to shop, having a computer in your pocket that gives you instant gratification is an accepted part of our mobile society. It should come as no surprise that retailers have increasingly moved their focus from bricks-and-mortar to digital and giving people a seamless shopping experience has become one of 2015’s marketing buzzwords.
Mobile is an ever-present device in the path to purchase. Around 33% of transactions have a mobile device involved in the initial research, with the final action occurring on a desktop.
The report said that apps generate around 58% of all revenue for retail companies that have adopted a mobile first attitude. Conversion rates are also higher through apps as compared to mobile browsers—3.7 times more transactions are conducted through a specific app, although desktops are still a significant driver of traffic.
Customer spend is also greater in an app. Criteo said that the average person will spend $116 using a dedicated retail app and only $91 and $100 in mobile browsers and desktop, respective. Around 14.4 products per potential shopper are viewed on an app and the consumer is 2.4 times more likely to add those items into their digital basket.
Smartphones: How We Buy Stuff
The mobile shopping experience is dominated by smartphones, with 56% of all transactions in Q3 coming from the palm of the hand. Criteo cites the fact that smartphone screen size has a lot to do with how we shop on mobile and says that retailers that have optimized the experience accordingly are reaping the benefits—64% of all mobile transactions are on smartphones.
In terms of how the United States is ranked against other nations, there is still some work to do, said the report. For example, mobile conversion rates in Japan are almost three times higher than the U.S., suggesting that Japanese consumers are more comfortable with using a device to shop then their American counterparts.
Source: State of Mobile Commerce Q3 2015
Mobile accounts for an average of 35% of all global eCommerce transactions—only Japan, the United Kingdom and South Korea breached that number in the last financial quarter. The U.S ranks 7th in the list and Critea says that this again allows for a significant amount of growth in the near future.
Cross-device purchasing is another area where the U.S. can improve. The global average for completed eCommerce transactions is 50% and the U.S. is 10th on the list behind South Korea, Brazil, Italy, France, Japan, the Netherlands, the U.K., Germany and Spain. Only the first four countries have broken through the 50% mark, which implies that multiple device transactions are still not the norm for the majority of shoppers.
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